Rory Kleinveldt will come home from his England season with at least one countrywide honour: the T20 Blast winners’ medal.
Northants beat Durham by four wickets in a match dominated by individuals. Durham’s Keaton Jennings is feeling the pain after he provided 88 of his side’s 153-8, hitting five fours and four sixes in his 58 balls. It was Jennings’ best T20 score, having never previously reached fifty. Big Ben Stokes was next best on 18 and no one else rose above 10.
Similarly Northants were reeling at 9-3, with Richard Levi having been run out for 2, when Josh Cobb stepped up to the crease. He hammered a brave 80 off 48 balls, with 10 fours and three sixes. The big difference was that he found in Alex Wakely a contributing partner. His 43 off 49 added to stand of 120 in 12.3 overs. The result was that Kleinveldt’s big bat was not needed, bar to see Northants over the line with two runs.
He came under some punishment in the Durham innings, taking two wickets for 40, including that of Jennings. But he played a major role by taking 2-24 in the semi-final earlier in the day. Apart from the medal, he also gets a share of the R1.6-million players’ prize money.
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